


Dream Of A Better World

by ThatWildWolf



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: As always they're both fucked up, Character Study, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Feelings Realization, Fluff and Angst, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Late Night Conversations, Male-Female Friendship, Platonic Romance, Romance, Romantic Friendship, Songfic, but not really
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-06
Updated: 2018-07-06
Packaged: 2019-06-06 07:49:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,766
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15190151
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThatWildWolf/pseuds/ThatWildWolf
Summary: "Hold on to the world we all remember fighting for, there's some hope left in it yet."In the aftermath of the battle of Trost, two soldiers seek comfort in each other's presence. One-shot.





	Dream Of A Better World

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally written for a songfic contest on Wattpad, which I've won second place of. The song was "Arise" by Flyleaf.

A small rag doll lay on the ground, nearly completely covered by dirt and dust. It was like a relic of a peaceful and now unreachable past, a remainder of the innocent childhood that had once been the commodity of all people. Now, it was lying forgotten on the empty street, just as it had been for a long time by then. And it would probably lie there for much longer.

If someone hadn't picked it up.

The woman looked at the doll with a sad look in her brown eyes as she held it carefully, mindful not to damage the material. She gently swiped some dust off of it.

"Hanji!" A friendly voice pulled her from her nostalgic zone-out to the harsh reality.

She took the doll and carefully placed in her backpack.

"I'm right here," she answered - not exactly shouting, but not quietly, either.

"There you are," said Petra, who had just rounded the corner. The warm smile froze at her lips when she noticed Hanji's expression. "Are you alright?"

The older woman nodded, though she did not smile.

"I'm fine." She sighed and looked at the sky. "It's getting dark. We should probably get going."

Petra nodded and, without a word, they set off in the direction of the temporary headquarters Commander Smith had set up outside of Trost.

Trost. Even though the city had been cleaned after the battle, it was still dead and depressingly empty. Life was only slowly returning here as the citizens gradually moved back to their homes. At least thanks to Mikasa Ackerman, all of them had managed to evacuate in time. The one good thing in the black sea of depression that followed the attack.

Of course, it was all over now. Had been for over a week. That didn't necessarily mean that soldiers like Hanji could take a rest. As always after a disaster, there was a lot of work to do. And it wasn't the cheerful kind. Identifying the bodies, searching the ruins... All of that could really make a person depressed.

Bleak.

That was the word, Hanji thought. Bleak. The perfect word to describe her mood, the city, the people's morale, the sky... Everything was just that: bleak.

"Thanks for coming with me." Petra said with a warm smile when they reached the barracks. Hanji nodded; she couldn't bring herself to be as cheerful as her.

"Whatever I can do to help," she muttered, then sighed when she looked up at the depressingly grey sky. It didn't seem like anything she would ever do could make a difference.

She left her backpack in her quarters and left for the Commander's office. Erwin would be waiting for her report anyway, so she figured she might as well deal with it sooner than later.

She didn't know how long did the - depressingly boring - meeting last, but when she left the office, the sky was significantly darker than beforehand.

Hanji hung her head. This was her life now; depressingly sad routine.

She was heading for her quarters, but something stopped her in the hallway. The door was open. She wasn't sure what to think, so eventually she just entered the room.

Everything was just as she had left it, with her backpack carelessly thrown onto the table and everything, except one of the two chairs she owned was occupied.

"Levi." She addressed her friend, hoping to get his attention. "I wasn't expecting you."

He looked up at her.

"Oh, sorry. I was looking for you and you weren't here and..."

 _Wow, he's talkative today_ , Hanji noticed.

"Levi." She hushed him with as sincere a smile as she could muster. She raised her eyebrows at his defensiveness. "It's fine."

"I know." He sighed. "I know."

Hanji noticed that all the while he was talking, his hands were playing with some small object she couldn't identify. She wasn't sure what it was until she came a few steps closer to him and realised that it was the ragdoll she had found in the city earlier. It seemed scary somehow, that Levi was paying that much attention to something that trivial.

"...Are you alright?" She asked softly.

Levi tensed - she could see the way his muscles shifted underneath the thin grey shirt - and looked at the ground.

"What if I'm not?" He retorted in a voice completely void of any emotion. "It wouldn't make much difference."

Hanji sat down on the chair next to his.

"It would to me."

He raised his gaze at her.

"Why?"

The simple, short question managed to falter her composure.

"Why?" She repeated. "Because I'm your friend. Because I care." She nudged him with her elbow. "Come on, tell me. What is it?"

"I..." He sighed in defeat. Hanji didn't rush him; she knew that he had never been very keen on talking about his feelings. He needed to take his time. "I was just watching the kids," he said finally. "Eren, Connie, Reiner and the others. They... They were talking Eren's usual nonsense, about retaking humanity's glory and everything, but..." He narrowed his brows. "They are just so set on it. It's... It's so _impossible_ how determined they are. And I thought... Well, it dawned on me that... They know perfectly well what they're fighting for. How old were they five years ago? Ten, eleven, some twelve. They can remember peace and what it was like. So can you, Erwin, Petra, Mike, and the other veterans. All of you... You know what you're fighting for. Only me..."

"Come on, you can't be any younger than me," Hanji was confused. "What do you mean you don't know what you're fighting for?"

"I never saw it." He looked down, trying not to let her see the tears that shimmered in his eyes. "Don't you remember? I used to live in the slums, the underground city beneath Stohess District, until Erwin found me." He shuddered as if the memory of that place alone made him uneasy. "Life down there was like hell, with everyday struggle to as much as survive. I saw people starving and dying on daily basis... Hanji, I have _never_ even _known_ peace. Never in my entire life."

Hanji hung her head.

"I'm sorry." She shut her eyes. "I'm being insensitive again, aren't I? I can't help it. Just because I lived up on the surface my whole life..."

He suddenly grabbed her wrist.

"Tell me."

Hanji looked at him, surprised at both the gesture and his words. She opened her mouth, but he answered her question before she managed to ask it.

"Tell me what it was like, living here in times of peace. Tell me about the world we are fighting for."

Hanji looked down at her arm, and Levi's hand wrapped around it. Then, her gaze slowly trailed up his body to stop at his pleading, nearly desperate gaze. At his eyes, widened from the emotions he was feeling and shining from the tears he refused to shed.

"Oh... I- Of course!" She forced a smile onto her lips. "Anything for you, Levi!"

He relaxed his grip on her wrist, but didn't let go. The message was clear: he was comfortable with the physical contact.

She grabbed his hand and he let her hold it, even going as far as to trace invisible circles on her skin with his thumb.

"What was it like?" She wondered aloud, not sure what to begin with. "The world five years ago... Life was easier. It was much, much easier. In reality, it wasn't that different... And yet, at the same time, _everything_ has changed." She nervously tapped the fingers of her free hand on the table. "What I mean is that it _looks_ the same, but _feels_ different. The world back then... Something just felt right. When you walked down a street, you could hear children laughing, and people chatting, and merchants trying to sell their products, and... I don't know, it was peaceful somehow. All that noise. Now, when you walk through a town, it's silent." She glanced at him, but he was listening with interest and... could it be regret? She looked away, somehow embarrassed by seeing him like that. "It looked different, too. You could just _see_ the difference. Colourful flowers, fresh green grass, blue sky... Everything is so cloudy and grey now."

"It is, isn't it?" He sighed. "Can't say I haven't noticed, but... I wish I had seen all of that. Then, I would know what I'm fighting for. I would have a memory to hold on to when..." He drifted off. "You know what I'm talking about."

"Yes." Hanji nodded. "I know."

They were both silent for a while after that. Levi put away the doll. He glanced out the window, at the grey, bleak clouds that covered the sky. Something in his face softened as he turned his gaze towards Hanji again.

"Tell me more," he asked. "Please."

She looked at him absently, but then blinked. She nodded.

"Sure."

They must have talked for hours afterwards; about the life before the Fall, the life in the underground, about what they missed, what they longed for, what they had lost. About all the dreams that they were afraid to give up on.

The whole thing made Levi feel warm inside in a strange way. There was someone he could talk to, someone he could tell all those things he was afraid to tell anyone else. He felt, in one word, free. Free to have that off his chest. Talking was good, he realised. It was something he didn't do that often, and maybe that was wrong. Because, having shared his problems with someone else, he felt happier.

Levi looked around. It was late already, of course, but, with some concern, he realised that he couldn't make out the outline of most objects in the room, for they all seemed nearly equally black. Either the nights were getting darker or he was getting old. He recalled times, not that long ago, when he could clearly see in the dark.

"I might need glasses soon," he muttered, then gently laughed at the irony of it. "What do you say to _that_ , eh, Four-eyes?"

Hanji tilted her head to one side and looked at him with the most beautiful smile Levi had ever seen on her face.

"What's made you this happy all of a sudden?" He asked, confused.

She was so shaken up by emotions that it took her a moment to answer - and even when she did, it was barely more than a whisper.

"You should smile more often."


End file.
